Anyone else with a boob-obsessed toddler?

[agapimou]

Dd is 14 months and has always been a great eater, she practically lived on the boob for the first 6 months. Now she is still not showing signs of slowing down and is attached to me every second that we are together. She feeds in the morning when she wakes up, before naps, at night, after solid food and a few snacks during the day. She goes to her gp for 5 - 6 hours per day while I work so I do get some respite, but as soon as I pick her up her hands are straight down my top twiddling my nipples and trying to latch on! She also likes to play with the other nipple while eating and pinches it between her nails which hurts like hell.

She eats plenty of solid foods, drinks water and juice and is gaining weight fine. I really don't want to stop breastfeeding but am not sure if it still meant to be this intense? I read about other mothers doing just a morning and night feed and I feel so jealous!

I have a boob-obsessed 21 month old (TBF he's not well at the moment, so I'll let him off) and my DD was the same when she was younger.

I think it's fairly normal to want to feed after being away from you, it's their way of reconnecting but I couldn't handle twiddling! 14 months is a good age to start having some 'rules' about feeding. Breastfeeding is a 2 way relationship.

DS isn't a twiddler but I do end up with feet in my face sometimes. I give him a 'warning' - basically "No kicking, we have milk nicely or milk stops." If When he does it again, I say it again and sit him on the floor. He'll cry and whinge, and after about 10-15 seconds I'll pick him up, tell him again that we have milk nicely or milk stops and start feeding again. Not long enough for him to get really worked up but long enough to know that I'm not playing a game. All calmly but gently firm. At first, I had to repeat it a few times but it did work and breastfeeding became a much better experience for me when I wasn't getting pissed off by it.

You might find that if the twiddling stops, you'll feel better about feeding as much. I also relate to the jealousy with babies who only feed twice a day, at the moment if I even sit down DS wants to feed and I find myself doing random cleaning of cupboards in the kitchen just to hide a bit